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reamy lipstick.
One look at those lips and my blood went hot. Some lonely corner of my brain was telling me to relax, but it was way too late.
“Jesus fuck, AJ. What the hell are you doing?”
AJ
It was pointless to act dumb, but I did it anyway.
“What?” I asked with convincing nonchalance. Impressive, considering the way Adam was raking his stare all over me right now, leaving a trail of heat over every inch of my bare skin he dragged his eyes across.
“You’re going to act like this is how you normally dress for a work function?” he asked as I walked out of the bathroom.
“Well, obviously not, but I didn’t initially plan on going to this party and all I packed were date-night dresses and lingerie,” I said, fastening the backs of my earrings. “So it was between this and the slutty maid costume, and for some reason I just thought this would be a little more appropriate.”
Adam’s eyebrows were still deeply knit as he looked at me, but I could see the reluctant interest twinkle in his eyes till he cracked a grin. “You have a slutty maid costume?”
I smirked. “Just pretend you didn’t hear that part.”
“Might take a minute.”
I rolled my eyes as I headed to the table, one hand braced on the table as I leaned over to ease myself into my heels—which was, unsurprisingly, kind of difficult with the heat of Adam’s unabashed stare on my backside.
Things still felt grey this morning, but it was like we just went from zero to sixty. Boundaries: Annihilated.
“Are you really checking me out that blatantly right now?” I finally called him out. But he didn’t exactly back down.
“Pretty hard not to when you’re bending over in a dress that looks like it’s going to explode off your body like a fucking rubber band.”
“Oh, and you’re slut shaming my outfit now?” Standing up straight again, I cocked an eyebrow at Adam, feeling a strange little thrill course through my veins when I caught the single tic in his jaw.
“Trust me. I’m a fan of the outfit,” he said tightly. “But it’s telling me something’s going on with you right now, because you normally want the opposite of this.”
“‘This’ being what?” I asked.
“Eyes,” he said, annoyed. “On you. Particularly at work. ‘I don’t wan’t to give them anything to talk about.’ That’s been your line for years.”
“Well, like I said, this is all I’ve got,” I said, my heels click-clacking as I went back to the bathroom to grab my lipstick. “And I figure if I’m wearing it, I might as well make it look good,” I shrugged, grabbing my clutch off the TV stand and not even having to look at Adam to know he didn’t buy it. We both knew that he didn’t, but we were going to leave it at that.
At least I thought we were.
But as I opened up my clutch to drop my lipstick inside, Adam stopped me.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa. Hold up.”
My eyes fluttered wide as he came bounding toward me in three long strides. “What?” I asked, stunned as I closed my clutch—but it wasn’t quick enough, apparently, because Adam hit me with a don’t bullshit me look.
“Open it back up,” he said.
And for the next five seconds, we stared at each other, engaged in a heated standoff that ended with me heaving a sigh and just opening my damned clutch, which contained exactly three things. My phone and credit cards, my lipstick.
And my toothbrush.
Adam looked at me, incredulous.
“You expect to be sleeping somewhere else tonight?” he questioned.
My mouth parted a few times before I settled on my reply. “I figured just in case,” I said with a nonchalance that clearly didn’t work this time, because Adam stared at me, his blue eyes searching me with unveiled irritation.
